$29 Snow Leopard retail disc will install over Tiger

It looks like Apple has "conceded" that it's possible to install Mac OS X 10.6 …

As many have speculated, Apple has added no technical limitations to the install process to prevent the $29 standard Snow Leopard disc from installing on a Mac running Tiger. The information was confirmed in an early review of Snow Leopard by All Things Digital's Walt Mossberg published late last night. "Apple concedes that the $29 Snow Leopard upgrade will work properly on these Tiger-equipped Macs, so you can save the extra $140" over the Mac Box Set, Mossberg wrote.

What he didn't say, however, is that doing so would violate the end user license agreement for Snow Leopard. Essentially, Apple's reasoning is that Tiger users never paid for Leopard, and therefore shouldn't get such a killer deal on Snow Leopard. But instead of implementing some draconian method to prevent the install from working (cough—Windows Genuine Advantage—cough), Apple is instead relying on the honor system, which it has for all its system software.

We know that not every Ars reader is so enamored with the concept of EULAs to begin with, but software companies often have graduated upgrade pricing depending on the version you are upgrading from. Apple's pricing for Snow Leopard is really no different in this respect. The Mac Box Set includes Snow Leopard as well as the latest versions of iLife and iWork for $169, so it's really not a bad deal. We also know about 2 percent of you don't want to dish out the ducats for the official upgrade path from Tiger. So, the real question is, do you want to violate the EULA to save some money, and potentially ruin it for the rest of us honest folk?